The Critical Guide to
the Warren Illustrated Magazines
1964-1983
by Uncle Jack
& Cousin Peter
Frazetta |
"Soul of Horror!" ★★★
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Angelo Torres
"The Lighthouse!" ★★
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Al Williamson
"Room with a View!" ★★★
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Steve Ditko
"Monsterwork!" ★★
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Rocco Mastroserio
"Under the Skin!" ★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Jerry Grandenetti and Joe Orlando
"The Monument!" ★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Alex Toth
"Full Fathom Fright" ★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Gene Colan
Peter reads Eerie as Jack looks on ("Soul of Horror!") |
Archie pulled inspiration from various sources (just as Al Feldstein and Bill Gaines did years before) and it's pretty clear he'd been cramming on Lovecraft about this time as "Soul of Horror!" has that distinct Dunwich/Innsmouth vibe without being overly plagiaristic. A nice touch is the business with the blackbirds (legend says the birds shriek and caw when they catch a departing soul but remain quiet when the soul is still free... so there's not a lot of shrieking going on in this tale) and Angelo's art is atmospheric, not relying on movie stills this time around. What's not discussed is the child that is "hijacked" by Simon's spirit, a baby that might have grown up to be an okay kid had a demon not stolen its body. Where is that baby's soul? I'm meandering. Good story, good art!
"The Lighthouse!" |
As Standish finishes his story, the men hear a racket downstairs and see the approaching figure of the young girl, who bursts in and launches herself at Eric. Both fall to the rocks below. The next day, Eric's body is discovered on the beach, entangled with the girl, dead for eighty years. A whole lot of Gothic goin' on here, with a bit of the "sins of the fathers" thrown in. That panel of the first body being thrown from the lighthouse is very vague; in fact, you could also interpret that the girl threw Matthew Frye Sr. to his death as the grandfather's fate is never actually disclosed. And everything Matthew/Eric tells us in the flashback is supposedly based on notes he found in the lighthouse. Why would Matthew Sr. confess to the murder? Bewildering. Williamson's art is fine; the final panel in particular is a chiller.
"Room With a View!" |
Let me just say what a pleasure it is to see Steve Ditko's mastery added to an already stellar bullpen. "Room with a View!" has both feet in what you might call Ditkoland, with sorcerers and gorgeous-but-a-bit-off gals and ghouls that hang on a precipice between silly and scary. Archie gives Steve a meaty script to work with (sure, it's got a few plot holes, but...) and could you see anyone but Ditko doing this script? I love Steve's 4-color work (obvious high points would be The Amazing Spider-Man and The Creeper, but you could also point a finger at his Charlton work as well... The Question anyone?) but this black-and-white work he'll do for Warren (16 stories all together) is insanely good stuff. We'll discuss his true Warren masterpiece in two weeks. How's that for a tease?
"Monsterwork!" |
"Under the Skin!" |
"The Monument" |
Evan Slater's architecture firm is going belly up due to a lack of exciting ideas. Slater orders his crew to come up with something fast but then stumbles on something in his office. One of his assistants had been cleaning out old files and came across some stunning designs drawn decades before by the now-retired Charles Langton Colt. Slater begs Colt to design a perfect house for his firm but Colt wants no part of it, citing old age and oncoming death. Slater appeals to Colt's ego, telling him that the building can be the old man's shrine, "The Monument" to his genius. Colt happily agrees and begins work. Of course, this being an Eerie script, Slater kills Colt after the house is built and moves onto the house himself, not realizing that the dodgy old rooster had built his bed as his final resting place, complete with automatic embalmer.
Frazetta at the toy shop? |
Both "The Monument" and "Full Fathom Fright" have ho-hum scripts centering around the greed of man, but both also have some dy-no-mite graphics. Like Ditko, Toth and Colan both excel in the black-and-white medium. Evan Slater's demise is deliciously grim. Colan can't hope to match that incredible sea demon Frazetta conjures on the cover, but he gives it the old college try Speaking of the cover, is it just me or does it look like Colorforms owes Frank Frazetta a bit of dough for "inspiring" their artists when creating Colossus Rex for their Outer Space Men toy line? Overall, one of the more satisfying complete Warren issues thus far. -Peter
Jack-I agree completely. Of course, the art is always better than the writing, but this issue was very good overall. I was glad to see Torres open the issue with strong work, and I thought "Soul of Horror!" was well-told and had a horrible ending. I've always liked spooky stories about lighthouses, so the Williamson entry was satisfying, and I agree that it's great to see Ditko in such fine form with "Room With a View!" I thought Rocco Mastroserio was very impressive at the start of "Monsterwork!" but his art wavered a bit as the pages went on and I thought the conclusion came out of left field. I was pleasantly surprised by the Grandenetti tale and my confusion over just what Orlando did or didn't do continues to grow. Is this art better because Joe inked it or was he involved at all? Alex Toth's work continues to amaze me and, in one panel, I saw that he used overlapping word balloons to demonstrate how repetitive the exclamations of various characters were. Was anybody else doing that? Finally, Colan's page designs are wonderfully creative, with oddly shaped, interlocking panels that allow him to expand or contract the size of the image as needed to tell the story. Overall, a very enjoyable mag.
Frazetta |
"Dark Kingdom!"★★★
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Gray Morrow
"The Castle on the Moor!"★★1/2
Story and Art by Johnny Craig
"Adam Link's Vengeance!"★
Story by Otto Binder
Art by Joe Orlando
"Overworked!"★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Dan Adkins and Wally Wood
"The Coffin of Dracula"★★
Part II
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Reed Crandall
"Out of Time"★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Alex Toth
"The Spirit of the Thing!"★★★1/2
Story by Archie Goodwin
Art by Steve Ditko
"Dark Kingdom!" |
Archie Goodwin and Gray Morrow combine to open this issue of Creepy with an exciting tale, far from the Universal monster "tributes" of which we're already growing weary. The story is well-plotted and the conclusion makes sense, even if the supposedly surprising twist at the end (the hand print) isn't particularly interesting. Here, the journey is what matters, not the destination.
"The Castle on the Moor!" has fallen on hard times, so Lord Everleigh has to give tours to visitors to keep it going. When one tour group is stuck there for dinner due to an injured coach driver, a busybody named Mrs. Hill goes where she was told not to go and ends up dead in the tower, victim of the lord's son, who happens to be a werewolf. The hungry, mad son goes on a rampage and kills all but two of the visitors and his own father before he is dispatched with a silver bullet. Miss Creighton, one of the surviving duo, is relieved until the other survivor, Mr. Wayne, reveals that he is a ghoul and plans to eat all of the dead folks, saving her for dessert.
"The Castle on the Moor!" |
Sheesh! I'm a big fan of Johnny Craig (or Jay Taycee, as he is credited here) and always like to see that he writes and draws his own stories, but this one is a clunker. I groaned inwardly when it was revealed that there was a werewolf on the loose, but I give Craig credit for drawing a pretty spiffy lycanthrope. The twist ending, however, is another matter. Everyone else is dead--surprise! I'm a ghoul! It just didn't work for me, and Craig's art, which can be a little shaky in his lesser efforts, is not quite up to the standard he set at EC.
Grandenetti??? "Adam Link's Vengeance!" |
This stinker of a story is credited to Joe Orlando and Eando Binder. The GCD tells us it's really Otto Binder we have to blame for the writing, but I am pretty darn sure Jerry Grandenetti is once again ghosting for Orlando, providing at the very least the pencils for this story. We've seen enough of Jerry's work in the last several years to recognize his trademark shaky big letters and black mask-like shadowing around the eyes. Take a look at the page reproduced here and see if you agree. The mystery of who really drew this mess is the most interesting thing about it.
Wood? Adkins? Who cares! ("Overworked!") |
In an interview in Comic Book Artist #7, Dan Adkins says that, around this time, Wally Wood was doing art breakdowns and Adkins was doing tight pencils, with either Adkins or another artist doing the inks. It sure looks like Wood's work to me, but perhaps that's the whole point. Adkins says Wood gave him credit because Steranko walked into Wood's apartment and saw Adkins working on the story. The tale is appealing to comic fans but it never really goes anywhere; it does, however, give Wood (Adkins?) the opportunity to draw scenes from many of the genres in which Wood excelled, such as science fiction, swordplay, and Gothic horror. Oh, and gorgeous women!
"The Castle of Dracula" |
Not much better than part one, this Dracula ripoff hits all of the usual notes but falls flat. I like the use of the name Varney, which shows some knowledge of vampire story history, but Crandall's heart doesn't seem to be in it this time around and the story is unoriginal.
After mugger Joey Quinn commits murder, he runs down the wrong alley and hits a dead end. Suddenly, he is transported to the 17th century, where a conjurer named Isaiah Curtin says they will trade places. Thrilled at being able to escape a murder rap, Quinn agrees, and Curtin disappears into the future. Just then, angry villagers knock at the door and, before you know it, Quinn is being burned at the stake for practicing witchcraft!
Toth's atmospheric work on "Out of Time" resembles a woodcut |
If the end of the story weren't so darn obvious from page three (of six in all), I would give this story more than two and a half stars. Once again, Alex Toth's art is stunning. In "Out of Time," he uses blacks so effectively that each page is a joy to view. Also in this issue, and reproduced at the end of this post, is a one-page bio of Toth in which he admits to being influenced by none other than one of our favorite targets, Frank Robbins! Also on that page is a piece of fan art by young Bernie Wrightson.
"The Spirit of the Thing!" |
Perhaps my own purple prose gives a hint as to how much I enjoyed "The Spirit of the Thing!," in which Ditko borrows liberally from his own work at Marvel on Dr. Strange and brings Goodwin's story to life. The art is superb and makes this the most exciting, entertaining tale in an up and down issue. I preferred Eerie #3 to Creepy #9, but the Toth and Ditko stories at the end sure improved the issue for me.-Jack
A Frazetta PSA from Creepy #9 |
"The Spirit of the Thing!" has the same kind of other-worldly art that made Ditko’s Dr. Strange a fan favorite, and an ultra-clever and intricately-plotted script. "Out of Time" is a tad too predictable for my tastes but at least it's given a nice Toth coat of paint. "The Castle on the Moor!" is an atmospheric but text-heavy Gothic which crashes and burns with its incredibly lame twist climax. Still, Johnny Craig's werewolf is surprisingly effective (I say that because we're not used to horror monsters from Mr. Craig, are we?). Do I really have to comment on "Adam Link"? Okay, it's awful. And not in a fun/awful way, as the last chapter seemed to be. This was a chore to read. Part II of "Coffin of Dracula" brings the extended thriller to an exciting and satisfying conclusion. Archie's doing a good job bringing the "classic monsters" into the Warren mags and applying novel twists rather than retreading the same old schtick. On the Creepy Fan Club Page, we get a bio of maestro Toth (whose mug shot makes him look like Mickey Spillane's twin) and some fan art from a 17-year-old Berni Wrightson. We'll have a little more to say about that guy in a few years' time!
Next Week... With the arrival of Kirby to the DC war titles The Losers finally lives up to its title! |
And in two weeks... We bid a fond farewell to Warren's bold experiment! |
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